Report calls for urgency on climate change
WELLINGTON: New Zealand’s first national climate change risk assessment has identified 10 significant areas that need to be urgently addressed by the Government in the next six years.
The risk assessment is an overview of how New Zealand may be affected by climate changerelated hazards, and will be used to develop a national adaptation plan over the next two years.
The assessment report, released yesterday, has been done based on a ‘‘highemissions, businessasusual future, resulting in a projected 67cm sealevel rise and 3degC temperature increase by 2090’’.
Extreme weather events such as storms, heatwaves and heavy rainfall are likely to be more frequent and intense.
Large increases in extreme rainfall are expected everywhere in the country and the number of frost and snow days are projected to decrease, the report says.
The National Climate Change Risk Assessment identified 43 risks that could have a major or extreme consequence to New
Zealand.
Of these, there are 10 risks the reports says require urgent action in the next six years. They are.—
To coastal ecosystems due to sealevel rise and extreme weather events.
To indigenous ecosystems and species from the enhanced spread of invasive species.
To social cohesion and community wellbeing from displacement.
Of exacerbating existing social inequities and creating new ones due to unequal distribution of climate change impacts.
To governments from economic costs associated with lost productivity, disaster relief expenditure and unfunded contingent liabilities.
To the financial system from instability due to extreme weather events and ongoing, gradual changes.
To potable water supplies, both availability and quality, due to changes in rainfall, temperatures, drought, extreme weather events and ongoing sealevel rise.
To buildings due to extreme weather events, drought, increased fire weather and ongoing sealevel rise.
Of maladaptation due to the application of practices, process and tools that do not account for uncertainty and change over long timeframes.
That current institutional arrangements are not fit for climate change adaptation.
There were some opportunities identified as a result of climate change, but the report noted research would need to be done to ensure responses to those opportunities did not worsen climate change impacts unintentionally.
The opportunities are higher productivity in some primary sectors due to warmer weather; businesses being able to provide adaptationrelated goods and services; lower cold weatherrelated mortality, and lower winter heating demand.
Maori will also be disproportionately affected, including risks to social, cultural, spiritual and economic wellbeing from loss and degradation of lands and waters, and from loss of species and biodiversity.
They would also face risks to social cohesion and community wellbeing from displacement of individuals, families and communities, and risks of exacerbating and creating inequities due to unequal impacts of climate change, the report found.
The Climate Change Response (Zero Carbon) Amendment Act 2019 requires a risk assessment at least every six years.
Climate Change Minister James Shaw said yesterday the report showed ‘‘the progress this Government has made to solve the climate crisis is essential to creating cleaner and safer communities across New Zealand’’.
‘‘Because of this report, we can see clearer than ever that the action our Government is taking to reduce emissions is essential for making sure we pass on a safer planet to our children and grandchildren.’’
Many of the risks we now faced could be traced back to the failure of previous governments to take meaningful action to cut our emissions, he said.
‘‘Whether it’s passing zero carbon legislation, fixing the emissions trading scheme, or supporting public institutions to switch to clean energy, we have been working to avoid worst impacts of climate change since the moment this Government formed,’’ Mr Shaw said. — RNZ
NEW Zealand’s first national climate change risk assessment makes for worrying reading about what may be a slowly unfolding national crisis.
Some of the 40odd risks are wellknown and have been taxing those long concerned about how our natural and built environments will cope in a rapidly changing world.
Its impact on potable water supplies, on regional infrastructure and on lowlying buildings are obvious inclusions on the shortlist of longterm problems. So, too, are the risks to ecosystems due to sealevel rise, extreme weather and from the spread of invasive species.
Other areas might not have been immediately obvious to anyone other than those who spend time understanding the knockon effect of significant, costly change.
It identifies threats to social cohesion and community wellbeing from displacement, and of the exacerbation of inequity due to unequal distribution of climate change impacts. It also identifies the massive costs associated with lost productivity, disaster relief spending and unfunded contingent liabilities.
Even the financial system could be affected by the instability arising from extreme weather events and the costly impact of tackling ongoing, gradual changes.
The list worsens as one reads on, as does the sense we are struggling to meet the risks headon.
The assessment says there is a risk of maladaptation due to the application of practices, process and tools that do not account for uncertainty and change over long timeframes.
Climate change’s impacts, it says, will be exacerbated because current institutional arrangements are not fit for climate change adaptation.
The assessment challenges the Government but this does not mean the Government will — or can — provide the silverbullet solutions the crisis may well need.
After all, the Government does not form all floodwalls or stopbanks. It does not plan subdivisions, urban water systems or stormwater drains. It leaves the doing to others: regional, city and district councils are at the pointed end of the response.
Councils are in charge of the emergency responses and policy directions that have the most obvious, immediate and longlasting effects on the local impacts of climate change.
They each make their own decisions as to how their districts should develop in light of climate change, and how they and their communities should respond to its most pressing effects.
They have their own policy frameworks which they develop in response to local concerns. They are helped by science and shared guidelines, but their policies are up to them.
Over the past five years, there has been a sense our towns and regions have been left to tackle the local effects of climate change on their own. Inconsistency has been a result.
The Dunedin City Council has a climate change adaptation plan and Mayor Aaron Hawkins has been clear in the need for climate change to factor in its decisionmaking.
Meanwhile, West Coast Regional Council chairman Allan Birchfield said climate change was a ‘‘rort’’ as his council digested a summary of the many hazards its region faced.
Such ‘‘political inconsistency’’ is par for the course in a democracy but having the tools to fathom what might seem unfathomable can minimise the risk this might pose.
Local Government New Zealand president Dave Cull says central government must now provide a framework enabling councils to increase their response to the ‘‘hyperlocal’’ but, cumulatively, nationally significant threats that come with climate change.
The Resource Management Act does not explicitly allow for climate change adaptation. The Act may be replaced, and it is hoped climate changeready policy will be quickly developed in its place. Until then, councils will continue to do as best they can, with the tools they have, in lieu of a unified policy response to local examples of a national — global — problem.